It isn't like he'd be acting or on-screen. As long as his voice holds out, Bowie would be fine. 'There are older and fouler things than Orcs in the deep places of the world.' - Gandalf the Grey, The Fellowship of the Ring

I'm just wondering if they're going to go with people more around Neil Finn's age, if they follow that trend. When I said producers, I meant the powers that be that's in charge of the getting the ending theme together.

I was thrilled by the use of adapting Tolkien's own lyrics for "Misty Mountain" as the credit song, and hope it's a trend through the three movies. There are three which would be appropriate for the Desolation of Smaug-- "The wind was on the withered heath" (found in the "Queer Lodgings"chapter, or "The King beneath the mountain" (found in the "Warm Welcome" chapter) or "The dragon is withered" (found in the "The Last Stage" chapter). The tone could be set by the melody as was done with the "Misty Mountains" song--a tune which I found utterly perfect in both the Dwarven version and the credits version by Neil Finn. Any of them could stand up to adaptation and fit right in. The first one and the last one should probably have a male voice, but I could imagine female voices in the second one.

For TABA, I can think of nothing better than the particular version of "Roads go ever, ever on" found in "The Last Stage". Of course that one was masterfully adapted already for the LotR stage musical--but that was a massive many-voice thing, and I think for the movie a solo voice and a more thoughtful and less energetic interpretation would make it perfect. Billy Boyd comes to mind for that one, and it would make a nice tie-in with LotR.

(And hopefully there would be no added silly lyrics encouraging people to stuff a goat into a butter churn in hopes of getting cream!)